Hill 304, with Hills 287, 310 and 275, forms from Malancourt to Marre Fort a line of natural fortresses, which kept under their cross-fire not only the roads of approach, but also the bare glacis and the abrupt escarpments immediately bordering them.
The covered ground nearest Hill 304 is the S.E. corner of Avocourt Wood. It was from this wood that the IInd Bavarian D.I. left to attack the Hill on March 20th, 1916.
They were checked, however, on the long barren slope leading to the ridge, by the French cross-fire. Their three regiments, on March 20th to 22nd, lost from fifty to sixty per cent. of their effective strength, without gain. On April 9th, before Hill 287, the first German attacking wave succeeded in crossing the French first-line trench, practically destroyed by bombardment. They were running towards the French supporting trench when the survivors of the front-line trench, coming out of their shelters in the upheaved ground among the dead, exterminated them to the last man.
On May 3rd, eighty German batteries concentrated their fire on Hill 304 and its approaches. Clouds of black, green and yellow smoke rose from the hill-top as from a volcano, obscuring the sky to a height of 2,500 feet, according to the reports of aviators. As a British war correspondent put it: “The sky was like a dome of invisible rails on which fast trains ran madly.” On May 4th and 5th a fresh German division attempted to occupy the position, believing it and its defenders to have been annihilated. They gained a footing on the N. slopes of the hill, but were driven back during the night by the French 68th R.I., which then withdrew. On the 5th the same German division attacked on the left the Camard Wood and Hill 287. In this wood, entirely levelled by an eleven-hour bombardment, the 66th Line R.I. first held up, then charged the assailants at the point of the bayonet. At Hill 287 a battalion of the 32nd Line R.I. likewise brilliantly repulsed two attacks. On May 7th, after a tremendous shelling, the enemy attacked Hill 304 simultaneously from three sides with troops from five different divisions. It was their greatest effort against this position. However, two French regiments of picked troops (125th and 114th), one company of which charged, to the strains of La Marseillaise, the Germans were thrown into disorder and driven back to the N. slopes. During the rest of the month the enemy counter-attacked continually, at times in force, as on May 18th, 20th and 22nd, but without success.
TRENCH ON HILL 304.
Reconquered August 24th, 1917.
On June 29th and 30th they sought to turn the Hill from the E. and W. with the help of liquid fire. On the E. desperate fighting took place around a work which was lost by the French on the 29th, then retaken, lost again, and reconquered on the 30th.
The Germans made a powerful attack on December 6th, in which they took several trenches on the E. slopes.
On the 28th of the same month another German attack, preceded by an intense bombardment, failed.